


(isn't it nice to know that) we're golden

by 26stars



Series: Fall Prompts 2020 [13]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: F/F, First Pet, Fluff, Married!MayBobbi, alcohol mention, dog mention, domestic AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-03
Updated: 2020-11-03
Packaged: 2021-03-08 19:21:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,341
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27361918
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/26stars/pseuds/26stars
Summary: Bobbi is late for dinner and Melinda doesn't know why until she gets home.For the fall prompt 'maybobbi+gold' and the fuff bingo prompt 'pet names' ;)Title from Relient K 'the lining is silver'
Relationships: Melinda May/Bobbi Morse
Series: Fall Prompts 2020 [13]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1931209
Comments: 22
Kudos: 20
Collections: Agents of Fluff 2020





	(isn't it nice to know that) we're golden

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Springmagpies](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Springmagpies/gifts).



> Thanks for prompting this Maggie! It has nothing to do with fall but it's full of (literal) fluff.

Melinda wasn’t used to Bobbi being late.

Her wife had run out to the store (“I forgot to get shampoo this afternoon and I’m completely out…”) over an hour ago, when Melinda had just put the rice in the cooker and started washing the vegetables for the rest of the dinner. Now, both had been waiting for half an hour for the second chair at the table to come home, and Melinda was starting to worry. She knew Bobbi was a perfectly strong and capable woman and probably could handle any trouble she ran into, but Melinda had already texted her twice on two separate apps and received no response.

What could be keeping her?

Melinda knew it was probably pointless to hop on her motorcycle and go looking for Bobbi, so she just sipped her wine and waited on the sofa, trying not to turn over her shoulder too many times to check out the window at the street every time a car passed. Finally, another twenty minutes and two more unanswered texts later, Melinda heard their garage door opening and jumped to her feet. She already couldn’t remember if she’d already had two glasses of wine or three while waiting, but the tilt of the room as she tried to hurry towards the garage suggested three.

“Bobbi, I swear to god, you better have a good reason for going off the grid like that…” Melinda called through the back door, but when she tried to push it open, she felt Bobbi pressing back from the other side.

“I have a reason, absolutely,” Bobbi said, leaning around from behind the door and sticking her face through the few inches of yielded space with a serious look, “and I’m about to show you what happened. But I want you to promise first not to get mad.”

Melinda tilted her head, needing to take a step to the side for balance as she did. “What are you talking about?” she asked, and Bobbi’s brow wrinkled.

“Have you been drinking? Without me?”

Melinda attempted to glare. “I’ve been waiting for you to get home so we could eat. Not my fault there’s no food in my stomach.”

Bobbi gave her an amused look. “Okay. Go sit on the sofa and I’ll be right in. No peeking.”

Melinda still wanted to protest but backed away, intrigued.

“Eyes forward,” Bobbi warned her, still not moving through the door until Melinda moved around the corner into their living room. She sat down on the sofa and waited, and soon Bobbi’s face appeared in the wall cutout between the kitchen sink and the living room.

_Hair still looks the same so it wasn’t a haircut…did she get a new tattoo?_

“Okay, now close your eyes and don’t open until I say.”

Melinda sighed dramatically and closed her eyes, and she heard Bobbi approaching, sitting down somewhere in front of her.

“Okay. Remember what I said about not getting mad,” Bobbi’s voice warned. “Now you can open your eyes.”

The first thing Melinda saw was her wife’s hopeful face. The second thing she saw was the puppy sleeping in her arms.

For a long moment, Melinda could only stare at it. Then she looked up at Bobbi in despair.

“What have you done.”

It was a question, but Melinda couldn’t summon the effort for the rising tone. The golden retriever puppy looked maybe three months old and was fast asleep, dozing draped across one of Bobbi’s arms with its head resting in the crook of her elbow.

Bobbi looked down sheepishly as she explained. “Well, I got everything from the supermarket and was headed out to the car, but I saw some people selling puppies out of the back of their van and went over to look, just for the fun of it. Wound up talking to the family, and they had one in the pile that they said they were worried about finding a home for because of his birth defect…said they were happy to just give him away if someone would take good care of him…”

“What’s wrong with him?” May interrupted, her brow furrowing.

Bobbi carefully shifted the sleeping dog, turning him around on her lap so that May could see his left side.

“He’s a foot shorter than his littermates.”

The front leg was completely missing its paw.

“They let me hold him, and then it was all over,” Bobbi says, finally looking up and meeting Melinda’s eyes again. “I’m sorry. I know I should have called, but…”

“We haven’t talked about getting a dog yet,” Melinda reminded her unnecessarily.

Bobbi tipped her head in acknowledgement. “But we’ve both said we liked the idea.”

“But we both work out of the house,” May goes on. “A puppy needs to have someone around more.”

“I can take him to work with me—you know I can talk my coworkers into anything,” Bobbi offered with a smile.

Melinda fell back on her last obvious protest. “We don’t have anything ready to bring a dog home.”

Bobbi nodded. “Well, that’s why I was extra late. I took him straight to the pet shop and got him a bed, collar, leash, bowls, food…it’s all out in the car.”

Melinda bit her lip, not allowing herself to say anything else. She was torn, with such a big decision being made without her input, but at the same time having trouble turning away an unwanted puppy or denying her wife something she’s obviously already attached to. As she stared at the dog in Bobbi’s arms, the little thing suddenly sighed, stirring and stretching before opening its eyes blearily. The puppy looked around the room confusedly, its eyes eventually landing briefly on May. It stared at her, then wiggled in Bobbi’s arms, sitting itself upright, and Melinda could see the missing front paw hovering proudly—the little guy didn’t even know he was different.

“That’s her!” Bobbi said towards the dog and pointing at Melinda with a smile. “That’s the other mama I told you you were coming home to!”

The puppy looked up at Bobbi with a happy puppy face, then back at Melinda, its eyes bright.

Melinda closed her eyes and sighed, knowing the battle was already lost.

“Okay, bring him here.”

Bobbi grinned wider as she came to sit on the sofa next to Melinda, moving the puppy onto May’s lap. It immediately sniffed all over her, then stood on its hind legs, its singular front paw planted on her shoulder, and started licking all over her face.

“He’s allowed on the couch _today,_ ” Melinda said indulgently in Bobbi’s direction as she wrapped her hands around the puppy’s tiny ribcage to hold him steady. “But only today.”

Bobbi didn’t look worried anymore “Of course,” she agreed easily.

“Did you already have a name in mind?” Melinda asked, turning to look the puppy over again. “He looks a little like a Clint to me.”

“I was thinking more of a Skywalker,” Bobbi said, reaching over to wiggle the puppy’s stump of a paw. “We know some people good with tech—maybe we can get him a bionic hand like Luke, too.”

“Daisy’s going to think we named him after her,” Melinda warned her wife.

“Well, you _are_ reacting to him the same way you reacted to her, once upon a time,” Bobbi said with a smile. “Initially pissed when they showed up but still melting in spite of yourself…”

“I’m not pissed, I’m just surprised,” Melinda insisted, finally reaching the limit of her tolerance for puppy kisses and pulling the puppy to her chest instead, petting his soft ears.

“I know you’ll whip him into shape in no time,” Bobbi said proudly, leaning over to kiss Melinda’s cheek just beside the coat of dog slobber. “He’ll be the best-trained dog in town.”

“Excuse me, but you’ll be taking fifty percent of the training responsibility,” Melinda said, passing the puppy back to her, unable to resist smiling. “Starting right now—he’s probably overdue for a potty break.”


End file.
